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The controversy surrounding the $400-million Encode project’s dubious public relations claims surrounding the function of ‘junk DNA’ and the Battelle Institute’s defense of the $3-billion Human Genome Project (HGP) as an economic miracle make this a good time to examine President Obama’s recent attempt to bring more of American science under centralized direction and control.

Well-established and politically connected scientists are salivating over the $100 million down payment proposed by the president this week for his BRAIN Initiative, (Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies, previously referred to as the Brain Activity Map project). No surprised here given the $2 billion promised in his State of the Union address. But young scientists not yet aboard the federal gravy train should recognize this as a threat to their future as independent researchers.